By Kit Norton

Aehr Test Systems shares spiked this week, ending two consecutive weekly declines, with the semiconductor equipment maker scheduled to report fiscal 2026 third-quarter earnings after the closing bell Tuesday.

The stock surged 36.3% to $44.32 this week and is up 119.5% on the year, according to Dow Jones Market Data. That includes gains in three consecutive trading days, rising 47.2% in that period. That marks the stock's best three-day stretch since late July 2025.

The rally started Tuesday with a 23.1% jump after the Fremont, Calif.,-based maker of semiconductor test and reliability equipment announced it received an initial order from a new customer that is a "major supplier to the data center optical transceiver market."

Aehr said Tuesday that the unnamed customer is developing advanced silicon photonics -- based transceivers for data center networking. The customer is addressing the "rapidly accelerating demand for high-speed fiberoptic communication links in hyperscale AI and cloud data centers," according to Aehr.

The order is for production of wafer-level test and burn-in of silicon photonics integrated circuits, used in data center optical interconnects and emerging optical I/O architectures for AI processors, according to Aehr. Burn-in is like a stress test of a component to detect problems.

The systems are scheduled to ship in Aehr's fiscal fourth quarter ending May 29, 2026. Aehr added that the customer has provided it with a forecast for additional systems, with follow-on orders possible later this calendar year.

A William Blair analyst team, led by Jed Dorsheimer, on Tuesday wrote that they have been expecting AI customers to flock to Aehr, resulting in an acceleration in orders.

"This order is another strong signal of Aehr's solution for AI end-markets and confirmatory of our thesis," the analysts wrote.

The firm estimates the new order value is roughly $10 million and speculate that the customer is a top transceiver supplier like Cisco Systems, Broadcom, Marvell Technology, Coherent, or Lumentum Holdings.

William Blair thinks Aehr could announce an additional $30 million to $50 million in orders in the next two months.

Meanwhile, Aehr reports earnings on Tuesday. Wall Street consensus expects revenue declining 41% year-over-year to $10.8 million with a loss of seven cents per share compared with a profit of seven cents per share a year ago, according to FactSet.

Stock action has been mixed following recent earnings reports. After the company's fiscal second-quarter report on Jan. 8, Aehr stock jumped 15.9% the following trading day. Shares sank 17.4% and 12.4%, respectively, after announcing fiscal first-quarter earnings and fiscal 2025 fourth-quarter earnings, according to FactSet.

Aehr shares soared 29.2% on April 9 2025 on its fiscal third-quarter earnings report a year ago.

"We expect the cadence of AI-related order wins to accelerate and catalyze shares," Dorsheimer wrote.

Write to Kit Norton at kit.norton@barrons.com

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 03, 2026 10:56 ET (14:56 GMT)

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